Leitch

We are officially less than a month before the start of the NFL season, so it's probably time to start previewing the monster. The key to the NFL's success — other than fantasy football and gambling, of course — is the rabid nature of its fans. That is to say: You don't see a lot of people painting their faces for their favorite golfer.

We asked a gaggle of writers, from the Web, from print, from books, even a TV guy or two, to tell us, in as many or as little words as they need, why My Team Is Better Than Your Team. This is not meant to be factual, or dispassionate, or even logical: We just asked them to riff on why they love their team so much, or what their team means to them, or whatever. We will be running two a day until the beginning of the NFL season.

Right now: the Buffalo Bills. Your author is J.E. Skeets.

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J.E. Skeets is a not a writer, but he plays one on the Internet. He writes at The Football Basketball Jones and he thinks watercress is underrated. His words were a little before and after the jump.

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Look, let's keep this quick: The only way my Bills have any chance of winning "Superbowl Chinese Surname" is — and cue the Dire Straits' Money For Nothing here — if Jon Voight, Gil Bellows, and some rotten oysters are involved.

Yeah, why Will asked me to write this, I have no idea. Punishment perhaps? I don't know. But if you think I'm going to sit here and "preview" another Buffalo Bills five or six-win season, then well ... you're absolutely right my friend! The Buffalo Bills will win five, maybe six games this season. There. Preview done. Is it story time yet?

January 31st, 1993. I'm 13 and the Bills are back in the Superbowl for a third year in a row. I'm fucking pumped — I mean, third time's a charm, right? — but my die-hard father is nervous as hell. We've watched two straight SB losses together — "Wide Right" and "The Helmets Game"— and well, I'm pretty sure the old man can't stomach another one.

I decide I'll try lifting dad's spirits by making him a "Go Bills Go!" sign. I bust out the Crayolas and have at it. I pour hours into this thing. It's probably the greatest poster/picture I've ever drawn — clean lines, great shading, it's fucking beautiful. Right before kickoff I proudly present it to him.

Now mind you, he's half-in-the-bag already, but he seems genuinely impressed with my work of art. He puts his arm around my shoulder and calls mom in from the other room to bring him some tape — "Jesus Lauree, I said Scotch tape. That masking tape will wreck the damn wall!" After some brief arguing, my heart is hung on the living room wall. I'm beaming.

As you can imagine, my dad is fucking furious (and drunk). He stumbles out of his recliner, rambling something incoherent about, "Thurman Thomas sucking giraffe cock", and then — yup, you guessed it — he pulls my "Go Bills Go!" off the wall and starts ripping it to shreds. Seriously, Dad went to fucking town on that sign. He was stomping on it, cursing it, kicking it — "Please John, not in front of the kids!" Hell, I think my little sister started crying. It was bad.